Brussels stalls on plans to ban high-power kettles and toasters over fears of
further upsetting British voters ahead of June 23 vote

Brussels is temporarily pulling the plug on plans to ban high-powered kettles and toasters in order to avoid giving anti-EU campaigners fresh ammunition in the Britain’s “Brexit” referendum, it was reported today.

The decision to shelve the plans until after the EU referendum comes as Brussels tries to minimise its reputation for meddling in all aspects of voters’ ordinary lives ahead of the June 23 vote that will decide Britain’s EU membership.

The plans to enforce greater energy efficiency on small appliances like kettles and toasters first emerged in 2014 and have become a hot-button issue among anti-EU campaigners who have drawn attention to the issue as an example of European over-reach.

"The only thing that should be toast is our EU membership," said Brian Monteith, Leave.EU's chief spokesman, "They may take our tea and toast but they will never take our freedom, but we can have both when we vote to leave.

Toast: A staple of the British breakfast Photo: Alamy Stock Photo

"We are constantly told leaving the EU is a leap in the dark but the real unknown is just how much more depressing and grim life will be in the homogenised, soulless EU. They are already taking menthol out of our cigarettes, next they'll be saying oil of bergamot causes cancer and Earl Grey Tea will be no more."

"Brussels is storing up all barmy regulations, power grabs and budget demands it can delay until after the referendum," added Robert Oxley, a spokesman for Vote Leave, "But if we vote remain quicker than you can boil a kettle the same damaging proposals will be back on the table and we will be powerless to say no. The only safe way to avoid a referendum hangover is to Vote Leave."

“What we want is to let the free market reign, not this diktat by bureaucrat,” said David Coburn, a UK Independence party MEP from Scotland who highlighted the proposals set out in the EU’s “Ecodesign” consultation.

Mr Coburn, who recently purchased a new kettle and toaster on moving house, has grumbled that his new appliances no longer seem to have the ‘oomph’ they once did. “I think I must have bought a euro-toaster, I have to put the bread in five times and it’s still pale and pasty. Perhaps it’s powered by windmills,” he told The Telegraph, “And the kettle? Watching a kettle boil has never been so boring.”

However Lucia Caudet, the EU spokewoman for Research, Science and Innovation, said the regulations were designed to deliver savings and efficiencies to EU consumers and make products like kettles - of which 60 million are sold annually in the EU - more repairable and longer lasting.

"We are still reflecting on which product groups we propose to regulate under Ecodesign or energy labelling measures in the future. Whether and how individual products will be regulated will ultimately be a decision for the European Parliament and the Member States.

"The Commission [is] committed to supporting reparability, durability, and recyclability in product requirements under the next working plans implementing the Ecodesign Directive, taking into account specific requirements of different products."

A senior EU official also rejected attempts to characterise the new rules on toasters as “barmy” by eurosceptics, arguing that regulation was a necessary function of creating a single market.

“We are always sensitive to member states. That said, electric products need to be safe and regulated. And in a single market in which goods are made, bought and sold in different places, that regulation has to be the same for all,” the official said.

The decision not to interfere with the time it takes to put tea and toast on English breakfast tables had been taken out of respect for “the British obsession with water kettles”, a senior EU official told the Financial Times.

After observing the underwhelming reception given to David Cameron’s EU renegotiation package and the host of senior defections from the cabinet to the ‘out’ campaign including Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, the Brussels machine is reported to be soft-pedalling other initiatives ahead of the vote.

These include plans to impose VAT on children’s clothes, a review of the working-time directive and new rules on free movement that could include elements of Mr Cameron’s EU deal, the paper reported.

The Telegraph understands separately that officials working in the EU directorates have been told to flag up with senior management if they find anything in their work that risks impacting on the UK ahead of the referendum.

The plan to ban high-power kettles and toasters has been considered as part an "Ecodesign" consultation designed to enable Europe to hit stringent new carbon emissions targets that required 40 per cent cuts in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2030.

The EU has already banned powerful vacuum cleaners with motors above 1600 watts, as well as incandescent light bulbs – moves that have been met with irritation across Europe including in traditionally pro-European countries such as Germany.

In 2014, when the kettles and toasters measures were first proposed, Günther Oettinger, the then German EU energy commissioner, defended the changes saying they were necessary to fight climate change.

“All EU countries agree energy efficiency is the most effective method to reduce energy consumption and dependence on imports and to improve the climate. Therefore there needs to be mandatory consumption limits for small electrical appliances,” he said.